PALAYAN, Philippines: US and Philippine troops held anti-tank missile exercises on Thursday, as the allies stepped up their largest war games, which have already drawn China’s ire.
Under a plume of black smoke, three cars parked on scrubland were crushed by missiles fired from about 600 meters (0.37 miles) away by three soldiers at a military base in the north of the Philippines.
The annual Balikatan maneuvers follow a three-day Chinese military exercise that simulated targeted strikes and a blockade of self-ruled, democratic Taiwan, which Beijing considers part of its territory.
“As you’re recently witnessing, there are some irresponsible behaviors that are ongoing and we should call those irresponsible behaviors out,” US Army Pacific Commander General Charles Flynn told reporters at the site, without elaborating further.
Flynn added that the war games were an important show of “collective commitment to maintain a free and open Indo-Pacific.”
Philippine Army chief Lt. General Romeo Brawner praised the “effectivity” of Javelins against Russian tank and armor in the Ukraine war, adding Manila plans to acquire the weapon in the future.
“We want to also bring that capability to the Philippine Army in order for us to be able to bolster our defensive posture and be able to defend our territory,” Brawner added.
The two allies also plan to hold new exercises in the South China Sea later in the year that will include other countries, US Defense Secretary Lloyd Austin announced in Washington on Tuesday, after a meeting with the Philippine defense and foreign secretaries and US Secretary of State Antony Blinken.
The exercise aims to boost Manila’s military capability while serving as a US show of support for its Asian ally amid China’s growing assertiveness.
Nearly 18,000 troops are taking part in the annual exercises, which for the first time will include the sinking by live fire of a decommissioned Philippine navy warship in the South China Sea, waters that Beijing claims almost entirely.
It follows a deal announced last week for US forces to use an increased number of bases in the Philippines, including one near Taiwan.
The exercises and growing US access to Philippine bases have angered China.
“Facts speak louder than words. Judging from the locations of the new military bases, the intention behind those sites is more than obvious,” Chinese foreign ministry spokesman Wang Wenbin told reporters in Beijing on Wednesday.
He warned: “We would like to once again remind the relevant country in the region that pandering to forces outside the region will not bring greater security, but will cause tensions, put regional peace and stability at risk, and eventually backfire.”
Balikatan will include military helicopters landing on a Philippine island off the northern tip of the main island of Luzon, nearly 300 kilometers from Taiwan, and the retaking of another island by amphibious forces.
It will be the first time the exercises have been held under President Ferdinand Marcos, who plans to watch the ship sinking on April 26.
US, Philippines troops fire Javelins in largest joint war games
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US, Philippines troops fire Javelins in largest joint war games
- War games an important show of ‘collective commitment to maintain a free and open Indo-Pacific’
- The two allies also plan to hold new exercises in the South China Sea later in the year
Sri Lankan president’s coalition wins majority in snap election
- Anura Kumara Dissanayake’s National People’s Power coalition won 137 seats of 196 for which direct elections were held
COLOMBO: Sri Lankan President Anura Kumara Dissanayake’s leftist coalition won a thumping victory in a snap general election, gaining power to push through his plans to fight poverty in the island nation recovering from a financial meltdown.
Dissanayake’s Marxist-leaning National People’s Power (NPP) coalition won 137 seats of 196 for which direct elections were held, a two-thirds majority, Friday’s ballot counting showed. Local media projected its tally would cross 150 in the 225-member parliament after more seats are distributed under a proportional seat distribution system.
That would give Dissanayake sweeping powers to even abolish the contentious executive presidency as he has planned.
While the clear mandate strengthens political stability in the South Asian country, some uncertainty on policy direction remains due to Dissanayake’s promises to try and tweak the International Monetary Fund (IMF) rescue program that bailed the country out of its economic crisis, analysts said.
Dissanayake, a political outsider in a country dominated by family parties for decades, comfortably won the island’s presidential election in September.
But his coalition had just three seats in parliament before Thursday’s snap election, prompting him to dissolve it and seek a fresh mandate.
The NPP secured almost 62 percent or almost 7 million votes in Thursday’s election, up from the 42 percent Dissanayake won in September, indicating that he had drawn more widespread support including from minorities and built on his victory.
“We see this as a critical turning point for Sri Lanka. We expect a mandate to form a strong parliament, and we are confident the people will give us this mandate,” Dissanayake said after casting his vote on Thursday.
“There is a change in Sri Lanka’s political culture that started in September, which must continue.”
Voters directly elect 196 members to parliament from 22 constituencies under a proportional representation system. The remaining 29 seats will be distributed according to the island-wide proportional vote obtained by each party.
TENTATIVE ECONOMIC RECOVERY
Celebrations were largely muted, with the exception of a few NPP loyalists who lit fireworks on the outskirts of the capital, Colombo.
The Samagi Jana Balawegaya party of opposition leader Sajith Premadasa, the main challenger to Dissanayake’s coalition, won 35 seats and the New Democratic Front, backed by previous President Ranil Wickremesinghe, won just three seats.
Sri Lanka typically backs the president’s party in general elections, especially if voting is held soon after a presidential vote.
The president wields executive power but Dissanayake still required a parliamentary majority to appoint a fully-fledged cabinet and deliver on key promises to cut taxes, support local businesses, and fight poverty.
A nation of 22 million, Sri Lanka was crushed by a 2022 economic crisis triggered by a severe shortage of foreign currency that pushed it into a sovereign default and caused its economy to shrink by 7.3 percent in 2022 and 2.3 percent last year.
Boosted by a $2.9 billion bailout program from the International Monetary Fund (IMF), the economy has begun a tentative recovery, but the high cost of living is still a critical issue for many, especially the poor.
Dissanayake also aims to tweak targets set by the IMF to rein in income tax and free up funds to invest in welfare for the millions hit hardest by the crisis.
But investors worry his desire to revisit the terms of the IMF bailout could delay future disbursements, making it harder for Sri Lanka to hit a key primary surplus target of 2.3 percent of GDP in 2025 set by the IMF.
“The country has given a clear mandate politically. The key question would be if this is at the cost of economic policy,” said Raynal Wickremeratne, co-head of research at Softlogic Stockbrokers in Colombo.
“I think with this majority they may try to negotiate a bit more on the (IMF) targets as well,” he said. “A continuation of the current reform program on a broader extent would be positive for the country.”
Wars, looming Trump reign set to dominate G20 summit
- G20 leaders gather in Brazil on Monday for a G20 summit set to be dominated by differences over wars in the Middle East and UkrainE
Security considerations — always high at such meetings — were elevated further after a failed bomb attack late Wednesday outside Brazil’s Supreme Court in Brasilia.
Police were probing the two blasts as a possible “terrorist act” committed by a Brazilian perpetrator, whose death was the sole casualty.
The summit venue is in Rio de Janeiro, in the city’s stunning bayside museum of modern art, which is the epicenter of a massive police deployment designed to keep the public well away.
Brazil’s leftwing President Luiz Inacio Lula da Silva will be using the opportunity to highlight his position as a leader championing Global South issues while also being courted by the West.
That role will be tested in the months and years ahead as Latin America and other regions navigate “America First” policies promised by Donald Trump when he becomes US president in January.
At this G20, it will be outgoing President Joe Biden who will represent the world’s biggest economy, but as a lame duck the other leaders will be looking beyond.
Just before the Rio summit, on Sunday, Biden will make a stop in Brazil’s Amazon to underline the fight against climate change — another issue that Trump is hostile toward.
The G20 meet is happening at the same time as the UN’s COP29 climate conference in Azerbaijan — and as the world experiences dramatic climate phenomena, including in Brazil where flooding, drought and forest fires have taken heavy tolls.
At the last G20, in India, the leaders called for a tripling of renewable energy sources by the end of the decade, but without explicitly calling for an end to the use of fossil fuels.
One invited leader who declined to come to Rio is Russian President Vladimir Putin, who said his presence could “wreck” the gathering.
Putin denied an International Criminal Court warrant out against him, for Russia’s actions in Ukraine, was a factor in his decision. His foreign minister will represent Russia in Rio.
China’s President Xi Jinping, however, will be attending, and will even extend his stay after the summit to make an official visit to Brasilia on Wednesday.
China is Brazil’s biggest trading partner, and the two countries have been touting themselves as mediators to help end Russia’s war in Ukraine, so far without success.
That conflict, along with Israel’s offensives in Gaza and Lebanon, will loom large at the summit.
“We are negotiating with all the countries on the final declaration’s passages about geopolitics... so that we can reach consensual language on those two issues,” Brazil’s chief diplomatic official for the G20, Mauricio Lyrio, said.
Those conflicts will be “the elephant in the room,” Flavia Loss, international relations specialist at the School of Sociology and Politics of Sao Paulo (FESPSP), told AFP.
But that should not prevent Brazil from finding consensus on issues that it has made priorities under its G20 presidency, she said, such as the fight against hunger or taxing the world’s super-rich.
Lula, heading up Latin America’s biggest economy, set out his line in May when he said: “A lot of people insist on dividing the world between friends and enemies. But the more vulnerable are not interested in simplist dichotomies.”
The Rio G20 summit will open on Monday with Lula officially launching a “Global Alliance against Hunger and Poverty.”
The initiative aims to rally nations and international bodies to free up financing for that campaign, or to replicate programs that have previously had success.
And on the issue of taxing billionaires, the G20 countries already declared a desire to cooperate to bring that about, as set out by their finance ministers who met in Rio in June.
It remained to be seen, though, whether the leaders at the summit would pursue that goal, and on what terms.
Following the summit, Brazil hands over the G20 presidency to South Africa.
Xi, Biden attend Asia-Pacific summit, prepare to meet
- Joe Biden and Xi Jinping are due to hold a face-to-face meeting Saturday
- APEC brings together 21 economies that jointly represent about 60% of world GDP
LIMA: US President Joe Biden and Chinese counterpart Xi Jinping will attend the first day of an Asia-Pacific leaders’ summit Friday ahead of a face-to-face meeting under a cloud of diplomatic uncertainty cast by Donald Trump’s election victory.
Biden and Xi are due to hold talks Saturday, in what a US administration official said will probably be the last meeting between the sitting leaders of the world’s largest economies before Trump is sworn in in January.
With the Republican president-elect having signaled a confrontational approach to Beijing for his second term, the bilateral meeting will be a closely watched affair.
Xi and Biden arrived in Lima Thursday along with other world leaders for a two-day heads-of-state meeting of the Asia-Pacific Economic Cooperation (APEC) grouping.
APEC, created in 1989 with the goal of regional trade liberalization, brings together 21 economies that jointly represent about 60 percent of world GDP and over 40 percent of global commerce.
The summit program was to focus on trade and investment for what proponents dubbed inclusive growth.
But uncertainty over Trump’s next moves now clouds the agenda — as it does for the COP29 climate talks underway in Azerbaijan, and a G20 summit in Rio de Janeiro next week.
On Thursday, APEC ministers, including US Secretary of State Antony Blinken, held their own meeting behind closed doors in Lima to set the tone for the summit to follow.
Trump announced this week he will replace Blinken with Senator Marco Rubio, a China hawk.
The summit will also be attended by Japan, South Korea, Canada, Australia and Indonesia, among others.
President Vladimir Putin of APEC member Russia will not be present.
Trump’s “America First” agenda is based on protectionist trade policies, increased domestic fossil fuel extraction, and avoiding foreign conflicts.
It threatens alliances Biden has built on issues ranging from the wars in Ukraine and the Middle East to climate change and commerce.
The Republican president-elect has threatened tariffs of up to 60 percent on imports of Chinese goods to even out what he says is an imbalance in bilateral trade.
China is grappling with a prolonged housing crisis and sluggish consumption that can only be made worse by a new trade war with Washington.
But economists say punitive levies would also harm the American economy, and others further afield.
China is an ally of Western pariahs Russia and North Korea, and is building up its own military capacity while ramping up pressure on Taiwan, which it claims as part of its territory.
It is also expanding its reach into Latin America through infrastructure and other projects under its Belt and Road Initiative.
Xi on Thursday inaugurated South America’s first Chinese-funded port, in Chancay, north of Lima, even as a senior US official warned Latin American countries to be vigilant when it comes to Chinese investment.
Biden, meanwhile, will on Friday meet Japanese Prime Minister Shigeru Ishiba and South Korean President Yoon Suk Yeol — key US allies in Asia.
Traveling with Biden, National Security Adviser Jake Sullivan said the partner nations will announce the creation of a secretariat to ensure their alliance “will be an enduring feature of American policy.”
China isn’t the only country in Trump’s economic crosshairs.
The incoming US leader has threatened tariffs of 25 percent or more on goods coming from Mexico — another APEC member — unless it stops an “onslaught of criminals and drugs” crossing the border.
Peru has deployed more than 13,000 members of the armed forces to keep the peace in Lima as transport workers and shop owners launched three days of protests against crime and perceived government neglect.
As Philippines picks up from Usagi, a fresh storm bears down
- Typhoon Usagi blew out of the Philippines early Friday as another dangerous storm drew closer
- Scores were killed by flash floods and landslides just weeks ago, the weather service said
MANILA: Typhoon Usagi blew out of the Philippines early Friday as another dangerous storm drew closer, threatening an area where scores were killed by flash floods and landslides just weeks ago, the weather service said.
As Usagi — the archipelago nation’s fifth storm in three weeks — headed north to Taiwan, rescuers worked to reach residents stranded on rooftops in northern Luzon island, where herds of livestock were devastated.
The recent wave of disasters has killed at least 159 people and prompted the United Nations to request $32.9 million in aid for the worst-affected regions.
On Thursday, flash floods driven by Usagi struck 10 largely evacuated villages around the town of Gonzaga in Cagayan province, local rescue official Edward Gaspar told AFP by phone.
“We rescued a number of people who had refused to move to the shelters and got trapped on their rooftops,” Gaspar added.
While the evacuation of more than 5,000 Gonzaga residents ahead of the typhoon saved lives, he said two houses were swept away and many others were damaged while the farming region’s livestock industry took a heavy blow.
“We have yet to account for the exact number of hogs, cattle and poultry lost from the floods, but I can say the losses were huge,” Gaspar said.
Trees uprooted by flooding damaged a major bridge in Gonzaga, isolating nearby Santa Ana, a coastal town of about 36,000 people, Cagayan officials said.
“Most evacuees have returned home, but we held back some of them. We have to check first if their houses are still safe for habitation,” Bonifacio Espiritu, operations chief of the civil defense office in Cagayan, told AFP.
By early Friday, Usagi was over the Luzon Strait with a reduced strength of 120 kilometers (75 miles) an hour as it headed toward southern Taiwan, where authorities had downgraded the typhoon to a tropical storm.
But the streak of violent weather was forecast to continue in the central Philippines, where Severe Tropical Storm Man-yi is set to reach coastal waters by Sunday.
The weather service said it could potentially strike at or near the heavily populated capital Manila.
A UN assessment said the past month’s storms damaged or destroyed 207,000 houses, with 700,000 people forced to seek temporary shelter.
Many families were without essentials like sleeping mats, hygiene kits and cooking supplies, and had limited access to safe drinking water.
Thousands of hectares of farmland were destroyed and persistent flooding was likely to delay replanting efforts and worsen food supply problems, the report added.
About 20 big storms and typhoons hit the Southeast Asian nation or its surrounding waters each year, killing scores of people and keeping millions in enduring poverty, but it is unusual for multiple such weather events to take place in a small window.
The weather service said this tends to happen during seasonal episodes of La Nina, a climatic phenomenon in the Pacific Ocean that pushes more warm water toward Asia, causing heavy rains and flooding in the region and drought in the southern United States.
North Korea tests exploding drones as Kim Jong Un calls for mass production
- Tensions in the region have escalated as Kim flaunts his advancing nuclear and missile program
SEOUL: North Korea tested exploding drones designed to crash into targets and leader Kim Jong Un called for accelerating mass production of the weapons, state media said Friday.
The country’s latest military demonstration came as the United States, South Korea and Japan engaged in combined military exercises involving advanced fighter jets and a US aircraft carrier in nearby international waters, in a display of their defense posture against North Korea.
North Korea’s official Korean Central News Agency published photos of Kim talking with officials near at least two different types of unmanned aerial vehicles. They included those with X-shaped tails and wings that look similar to the ones the country disclosed in August, when Kim inspected another demonstration of drones that explode on impact.
The drones flew various routes and accurately struck targets, KCNA said. Its images showed what appeared to be a BMW sedan being destroyed and old models of tanks being blown up.
Kim expressed satisfaction with the weapons’ development process and stressed the need to “build a serial production system as early as possible and go into full-scale mass production,” noting how drones are becoming crucial in modern warfare.
KCNA paraphrased Kim as saying drones were easy to make at low cost for a range of military activities. The report didn’t say if Kim spoke directly about rival South Korea, which the North Korean drones are apparently designed to target.
North Korea last month accused South Korea of sending its own drones to drop anti-North Korean propaganda leaflets over the North’s capital of Pyongyang, and threatened to respond with force if such flights occur again. South Korea’s military has refused to confirm whether or not the North’s claims were true.
Tensions in the region have escalated as Kim flaunts his advancing nuclear and missile program, which includes various nuclear-capable weapons targeting South Korea and intercontinental ballistic missiles that can potentially reach the US mainland.
Kim is also allegedly sending military equipment and troops to Russia to support President Vladimir Putin’s war on Ukraine, which raised concerns in Seoul that he would get Russian technology in return to further develop his arsenal.
In addition to his intensifying nuclear threats, Kim has also engaged in psychological and electronic warfare against South Korea, such as flying thousands of balloons to drop trash in the South and disrupting GPS signals from border areas near the South’s biggest airport.
South Korean officials say North Korea will be a key topic in a trilateral summit between South Korean President Yoon Suk Yeol, US President Joe Biden and Japanese Prime Minister Shigeru Ishiba this week at the Asia-Pacific Economic Cooperation meetings in Peru.
South Korean Foreign Minister Cho Tae-yul and US Secretary of State Antony Blinken met on the margins of the APEC on Thursday and discussed “strong concerns” over deepening ties between Pyongyang and Moscow, particularly the deployment of North Korean troops to support Russia’s war against Ukraine, the US State Department said.
